News and Updates

As a kid growing up in Philly in the late 70s, my childhood buddy, actor Tim Cain introduced me to the music of Andraé Crouch. In that vein, I’d been soundly hypnotized by the works of Walter and Edwin Hawkins and that was the only contemporary sound with which I identified. Upon further research, I learned that Andraé spent time up in the Bay Area with the likes of the Hawkins family as well as The Family Stone in their early years. (To this fact, I should lament, the history and greatness of West Coast artists is criminally neglected.)

The children of the 40s (hippies, flower children and Jesus movement followers during the 60s,) had a great advantage of being socially conscious and artistically productive at a time of major change in the world. It was a generation that had witnessed the loss of America’s innocence. The paradigm was shifting, the tide was turning and the guard was changing. Tired, worn and weary of the oppressiveness and hypocrisy poisoning traditional institutions, young people of faith were seeking non-traditional ways of evangelizing. This attitude first permeated the secular world and resulted in a jolt to the music world.

As a result (and manifesting itself a short time before the freakish success of O, Happy Day,) Andraé Crouch’s music possessed that rare and effective diversity present in artists like Ahmad Jamal, Stevie Wonder or Earth, Wind & Fire. As a lyricist, he synthesized the hymnody style of Fanny J. Crosby, the testimonial style of former blues pianist Thomas Dorsey, the folk style of Dorothy Love Coates and the colloquial style of James Cleveland into an undiluted, passionate, empathetic and graphic message of faith, love and Jesus Christ. On this, he was wholly unwavering.

Crouch was a unique and unorthodox stylist both as pianist and vocalist. He did exactly what he needed to do to convey messages in a personal, engaging and direct manner. His sound was identifiable and incomparable.

Did I mention he was completely self-taught?

If you’re uncertain what genius is, I encourage you to go back and read my tribute again.

When I was 4, my Aunt Barbara gave me an inch high stack of used vinyl records that she purchased for about 25 cents from a flea market. Included in that stack was Dave Brubeck’s “Time Further Out”, recorded May/June 1961. When I put on the first track, “It’s a Raggy Waltz”, it struck a chord with the funny, adventurous side of my “old soul.” That’s all I knew; here’s what I DIDN’T know then:

I didn’t know that this record was over 10 years old.
I didn’t know that Mr. Brubeck was a leading force in the “Cool Jazz” era.
I didn’t know that he, along with Max Roach, was a master of odd time signatures.
I didn’t know that Dave Brubeck was White and Modoc.

I didn’t know ANY of that and didn’t care.

Here’s what I do know: we have to stop guilt-tripping young musicians into playing Jazz. They’re not going to find their place that way and ultimately, this is what freedom of choice is all about as an artist. If they have to ask too many questions and don’t have the innate desire to consume this music with love and burning passion, then there’s a good chance they weren’t meant to play it. If there is a contingency that wishes to label swinging as “old hat” and “outdated” – I can’t do anything about that, except to keep being pro-swing. “Anti-” is going to get you nowhere – fast.

The only way to “preserve” the music is to keep playing it. History gets written down – we learn about it. We’ll never forget wars, inventions, catastrophes – largely because these events have been documented (with some accuracy) and re-told over the ages. For those of us that love swinging, we have to simply continue in that vein. If we allow ourselves to get discouraged because of who’s on what magazine covers, who’s on whose gigs, who’s in which venues – we become bogged down in the mire of bullshit that has absolutely nothing to do with being artistic: performance, creativity and the edification of others.

One of the slickest things about this arrangement of “But Not For Me” is that it defines Ahmad Jamal’s subtleties. In the trio, each guy is doing something very specific, but you don’t think you’re listening to an arrangement—you’re just enjoying the ride. When Ahmad Jamal improvises on a form, he’s constantly playing over the barline—he’s not strictly defining the top and end of a form, but completely easing across it musically, making for an entity versus a series of choruses. You don’t think about keys or tempos or modulations or time signatures or anything like that. Another slick thing about the piece is that super-hip modulation at the top of the last chorus, where he slides right from C-major (his favorite key) into F-major. For years, I didn’t even realize that he had modulated.